The present invention relates to a new method for the effective therapeutic treatment of ocular diseases especially maculopathy and non arteritic anterior ischaemic optic neuropathy (NAION).
In the past ophthalmological diseases like age-related maculopathy (AMD) retinal vein occlusion, diabetic retinopathy, arterial occlusion, uveal effusion syndrome, NAION, Stargardt-disease, uveitis, and maculopathy of different origin could not be treated with a generally accepted therapy. For example for the treatment of AMD lasering treatments, radiation and operation were used. However these methods had no effect on the further development of the disease in many of the patients suffering therefrom. Out of the different ocular diseases AMD is the major disease. AMD is a severe progressive disease which occurs in the elderly. It is considered to be the most frequent cause of blindness in patients beyond an age of 65 years. There are more than 4.5 million Americans suffering from this disease. Two types of AMD are known. The "dry" form develops more slowly, however ends up in blindness generally not later than after 12 to 14 years.
The second form the "wet" type progresses rapidly leading to blindness generally within a few up to 7 years though sometimes much shorter within months. The other ocular diseases which are mentioned above are not so common but also for these diseases no general accepted therapy exists. Therefore, there is a great need for a new and effective therapeutic treatment of the above ocular diseases. In the early '90s the inventors of the present invention observed that the elimination of fibrinogen and plasma proteins of higher molecular weight led to an increase of the visual acuity of patients suffering from macular disease and uveal effusion syndrome (Brunner, Borberg et al. Acta Medica Austriaca 1991, 18, supplement 1, page 63 to 65). In this document 1 patient with uveal effusion syndrome and 16 patients which maculopathy were treated. The haematocrit was reduced by erythrocyte apheresis. Fibrinogen and plasma proteins were eliminated by plasma exchange using a solution of 5% human albumin. The visual acuity of 9 of the patients with maculopathy was significantly increased after one therapy.
In a further publication from 1991 (Brunner, Borberg et al., Dev. Ophthalmol., Karger (Public.) Basel, 1992, vol. 23, p. 275 to 284) it was studied whether clinical improvements could be obtained by plasma exchange therapy with patients suffering from intermediate uveitis using a solution of 5% human albumin. It was found out that both the haemorheological and immunomodulatory effects of this treatment could be beneficial in this disease. Human albumin as well as preserved serum were used as exchange fluids.
However, a general concept for the effective therapeutic treatment of ocular diseases was not described in these documents.
Therefore it was the object of the invention to provide a method for the effective therapeutic treatment of ocular diseases, especially different kinds of maculopathy and NAION.